Chapter 26 Oh. Em. Gee
Tegan
My eyes fluttered half open, the air in the beach house bedroom was cool, salted with the ocean breeze drifting through the open balcony doors. For a moment, I thought I woke up in heaven. Maybe Hayes finally fucked me to oblivion?
The events of yesterday flashed through my eyes. The sheets were tangled, damp with sweat and the aftermath of another brutal, wordless collision. I tried to move but the ache between my legs kept me in place. Shit, how am I supposed to escape from here when I can't even walk?
It had been hate, pure and simple. No tender words, no gentle touches. Just him pinning me down, against the window, my nails scraping his back, his mouth biting at my neck, both of us using each other’s bodies to vent a fury that had no other outlet. It ended with him driving into me so deep I saw white light behind my eyes, my scream muffled by the pillow, his own release a silent, rigid shudder against me. I should feel filthy but I enjoyed it,and reminiscing about it now makes me--
No way, I need to leave.
We had a little banter about me not listening to him, I've totally forgotten how that went,but I surely won.
Then, as the last tremors faded, he didn’t roll away. How we got to the room is still a mystery to me. He didn’t dismiss me or tell me to leave.
He forced me to cuddle. Yup, Hayes Ashford is the cuddly type.
“Turn over,” he’d grunted, his voice still rough from exertion.
I’d been too spent, too hollowed out to protest. I turned onto my side, facing the open balcony and the dark, noisy sea. He shifted behind me, his body still radiating heat. One arm slid under my neck, the other wrapped around my waist, pulling me back flush against him. His toned chest hard against my back, his legs tangling with mine. He held me like a possession.
“Sleep,” he’d commanded into my ear, and then his breathing had slowed, deepened.
I hadn’t thought I could. But exhaustion, physical and emotional, dragged me down into a shallow, uneasy sleep, trapped in the cage of his arms.
I can feel his warm hands on me,I guess that's what woke me up, this touch was different. It felt, Soft. Unconscious.
His hand, the one draped over my waist, had drifted up in his sleep. His palm was resting lightly on the underside of my boob, his fingers curled loosely around the swell. His other arm was still beneath me, his hand splayed open on my sternum, his thumb resting in the hollow of my throat. His breath was a steady, warm rhythm against the back of my shoulder.
And I… I just lay there. Feeling the slow, even beat of his heart against my spine.
I know I should get up and move away from here before he makes up. I should find a way to escape this beautiful island but instead I stayed there watching the sky from the open balcony.
My anger was there, a dormant coal. But in this strange, suspended moment, it was quiet.
I let my eyes trace what I could see of him. The sharp line of his jaw against my shoulder. The perfect, absurdly pretty slope of his nose. The fan of his white hair across the pillow, not stark white, but the color of winter sunlight, silvery and soft against the dark sheets.
From this angle, I could see the edge of the tattoo that snaked over his shoulder and down his arm: intricate, black lines forming a pattern of ice and chains. It was beautiful. Cruel. Like him.
He’s pretty. A pretty monster.
His fingers on my breast twitched slightly, a sleepy, involuntary flex. A shiver ran through me that wasn’t entirely revulsion.
Then his breathing changed. The deep, sleep rhythm stuttered. I felt him stir behind me. His hand on my breast tightened, not in a grab, but in a conscious, waking acknowledgment of where it was. His thumb at my throat began a slow, idle stroke.
“You’re awake,” he murmured, his voice sleep-softened, stripped of its usual icy edge.
I didn’t answer. I kept staring at the ocean, pretending I was still asleep, trapped in this weird cuddle session. We hate each other, we shouldn't be wrapped around each other.
He nuzzled the back of my head, his lips brushing my hair.
“I felt your eyes on me. Admiring the view?”
I couldn’t help it. A scoff escaped me. “The view is of the ocean.”
He just hummed, His arm around my waist tightened, pulling me even closer. My back was now completely molded to his front.
“You were looking at me. Cataloging my tattoos. Thinking about how my hair looks like something an elf prince would have in one of your fantasy books.”
The accuracy was definitely unsettling.
“You’re not a prince,” I muttered.
“You’re the evil king.”
He chuckled, a low, warm sound that vibrated through me. “Evil kings have the best castles.” He paused.
“And the warmest beds.”
We lay in silence for another minute, the rising sun warming the room. His hand on my breast was just… there. A weight. A possession. But in the quiet dawn, it felt almost… neutral.
“You cling like a koala,” he said suddenly, his tone shifting to something lighter, teasing.
I stiffened. “I’m not clinging. You’re holding me. I’m trapped.”
“I could feel you, your arms wrapped around my waist in a tight grip, the whimper that escaped your lips when I turned, you literally refused to let my arm go” His fingers traced a lazy circle on my skin.
“Even right now. You're curled into me. Your leg is hooked over mine. You’re clinging, princess.”
The observation was mortifying. I tried to move my leg. He clamped his down, preventing the escape.
“Don’t,” he said, not harshly.
“It’s cute.”
“We’re not cute,” I snapped, the familiar hostility rushing back to fill the quiet space.
“We’re enemies who fuck. This is… post-fuck protocol or something.”
“Post-fuck protocol,” he repeated, amused.
“Right. And the protocol says you shut up and let me sleep” He shifted his head so he could look at my profile.
“Evil king,” I repeated into the silence, trying to make small talk with him. For some weird reason.
“That implies a kingdom. What’s your kingdom, Ashford? This beach house? The hockey rink? Or Ashford holdings?”
He groaned, clearly from me not letting him sleep peacefully,he didn't want to answer my bullshit questions or have post-fuck therapy session with me.
“The rink is the throne room,” he murmured, his voice a low vibration.
“Cold, hard, everyone fighting for my favor. The beach house is the royal retreat. Where I keep my…” He paused, and his hand slid down from my sternum to rest possessively on my hip. “…treasures.”
The word, spoken in that sleep-rough voice, sent an involuntary shiver through me. I fought it, tensing against him.
“Treasures you terrorize.”
“Terrorize, protect… it’s a thin line for a monarch.” He nuzzled my hair again.
“And you’re the… what? The rebellious princess from the neighboring kingdom? The one sent to broker a peace treaty you have no intention of keeping?”
The analogy was absurdly, infuriatingly on point. The fundraiser was a peace treaty. And I was rebelling against it with every fiber of my being, even as I carried out its terms. Like a naughty girl.
“I’m not a princess,” I grumbled.
“Princesses get ball gowns and true love’s kiss. I get pencil skirts and hate-fucks at the rink.”
He chuckled, the sound genuinely amused.
“You’ve got silk dresses,which are way hotter than ball gowns. And as for the kiss…” His lips brushed the shell of my ear.
“I’d say my kisses are truer than most. They don’t lie about what they are.”
That was the problem. They didn’t lie.
“So if you’re the evil king,” I said, trying to steer it back to the joke, to keep it light, to armor myself with sarcasm, “does that make your white hair your crown? The elven prince thing?”
“It’s not elven, koala” he said, but there was no irritation.
“Don't call me that” I snapped.
Before I could muster another retort, The bedroom door, which he’d left slightly ajar, flew open.
“Oh. Em. Gee—"
I froze. Hayes’s entire body went rigid against mine.
Time stopped.